Between Shades of Gray [Hardcover]

Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

"Lina is just like any other fifteen-year-old Lithuanian girl in 1941. She paints, she draws, she gets crushes on boys. Until one night when Soviet officers barge into her home, tearing her family from the comfortable life they've known. Separated from her father, forced onto a crowded and dirty train car, Lina, her mother, and her young brother slowly make their way north, crossing the Arctic Circle, to a work camp in the coldest reaches of Siberia. Here they are forced, under Stalin's orders, to dig for beets and fight for their lives under the cruelest of conditions.

Lina finds solace in her art, meticulously - and at great risk - documenting events by drawing, hoping these messages will make their way to her father's prison camp to let him know they are still alive. It is a long and harrowing journey, spanning years and covering 6,500 miles, but it is through incredible strength, love, and hope that Lina ultimately survives. Between Shades of Gray is a novel that will steal your breath and capture your heart."

Please tell me I'm wrong. Tell me that this story isn't actually real. Because if it is, I'm such an ungrateful, selfish creature and I should rot in hell. *Breathe in, Breathe out*

Stalin killed millions. Yet, all people talk about is Hitler. I'm 20 years old, I don't know history, and honestly I never liked it, but the fact that Hitler is popular and Stalin is not, strikes me as weird. The Jews weren't left to die in Siberia, they were killed, burned, simple, easy. They didn't have their mothers die in thier hands, or hear about their fathers die a hundred miles away.
I'm not saying that Hitler did any better than Stalin, they both deserve much worse than Hell, if that ever existed.

Back to the story, shall we? I loved the way the story began. It was easy to read, and I would have had no problem finishing it in a day, if I didn't have school in the morning *Sigh*. I was thankful that I chose to finish the book in my room, for the snobs would have made my brother laugh at me for hours. Of course bad things happened from the beginning, but when you reach chapter 70, it just keeps going downhill. I wanted to stop. I couldn't bear the pain. But I knew that I could only get a piece of mind if I reached the ending. The ending was a bit soothing, like a cough medicine, sweet and stops the cough for a few hours. I know I will wake up tomorrow crying, or even worse, have dreams about it.

I recommend this book to everyone. History lovers, Fiction lovers, Book lovers who love a good cry, this book is made for you, PICK IT UP NOW!

xoxo,
Angel.

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